Meditation

There's a series of enrichment lectures at Google (the company) and they make them available for public viewing on YouTube. The lectures are not strictly technical and encompass a wide variety of topics with guest speakers.

The below video is of a lecture describing the basics of Oriental medicine practices, especially acupuncture and acupressure. There's also specific attention to stress in traditional western medicine and in eastern. 

In the second part, after the description, an eastern medicine doctor applies short acupunture treratment to some of the listeners and guides through a short relaxation meditation.

I’ve just finished reading Lawrence LeShan’s book A New Science of the Paranormal: The Promise of Psychical Research. I’ve received the book for the review from its publisher, Quest Books. It went out in April this year.

I must say that I’ve never heard of Lawrence LeShan earlier although, based on the book, he was researching paranormal for several decades. He was born in 1920, he’s trained and published psychotherapist, and is the author of the best selling book How to Meditate: A Guide to Self-Discovery.

“A New Science of the Paranormal” consists of seven chapters and an appendix. Each chapter also includes one or two “case histories” – a paranormal case from Lawrence’s career or another famous case. The chapters in the book are:

1. Psychic Research and the Consistency of the Universe.
2. What Do We Know About Psychic Phenomena
3. Normal and Paranormal Communication
4. Designing a Science of Psychical Research
5. Psi and Altered States of Consciousness
6. The Next Step: Implications of the New Science
7. What Dare I Hope

The Appendix in titled: “When is Uvani”.

Chapter 1 tells some history of psi research, the concepts, why is it difficult, including psychological factors. One tidbit is his current disapproval of connecting psi and quantum physics which has become so popular lately.

Chapter 2 describes the 4 things that were proven about paranormal research and 9 which are almost certain to be true.

Chapter 3 tries to compare normal and paranormal types of communication. He gets away from the “paranormal” terminology into cleaner one in order to better understand the differences and similarities between regular and “paranormal” communication types.

Chapter 4 begins what I think was the main goal in writing the book in the first place. Lawrence explains how science approaches different subjects and argues which approaches would be best for psychical research. He writes that he now believes that psi research should be approached not with more laboratory testing, like exact sciences, but like social sciences which employ other methods of research and deduction.

In Chapter 5 Lawrence describes how theories about “reality” shape the worldview and how the conflicts between observed phenomena and what we think about reality should be handled, in science. It is quite a philosophical chapter, in the good sense of the word.

Chapter 6 starts with some more psychological effects of psi events. How people reject them after they happen. This chapter also has a call to scientist to bring psi research into the mainstream science and also explains how to do this.

In Chapter 7 LeShan hopes that the acceptance of the existence of psi by the public will bring change to the way people think of the world and how they behave, to the better.

The Appendix is like a chapter by itself. In it LeShan tries to continue his design of the new science of the paranormal. He explains how we might try to overcome some difficulties with psi research by asking the right questions and thinking of it all in more abstract way, like in mathematics, for example.

The case histories after each chapter are very interesting and diverse. I’ve never heard of any of them although they all seem very compelling. They are all what a skeptic of psi would call “anecdotal” but again, one of the main points that Lawrence LeShan tries to pass in the book is that psi research should be taken out of the laboratory and the focus should be on these unique and very strong cases, which he calls “need-determined”. These are the cases where something “paranormal” happens because of a great need of some other person.

If you’re serious about psi research, consciousness and want to get a wider point of view on the various difficulties of this research and how to approach it, you should read “A New Science of the Paranormal”. It is quite different from many other books which are either too unscientific on one hand, or those which are heavy on statistics on another.

I think Leshan could also be a good guest for the Skeptiko podcast.

An article in OregonLive.com reports about various studies performed by different scientists related to meditation and the brain.

The first one, performed in the University of Oregon by Michael Pisner and Yi-Yuan Tang, compared focusing ability of college students, those who received meditation training and those who didn’t. After five days, meditators outpaced non-meditators on the attention test, and they became significantly better at handling stress. Saliva samples revealed lower levels of the hormone cortisol when the meditators were subjected to an anxiety-inducing math quiz.

Another study, in the University of Wisconsin at Madison, showed that meditation may sharpen the ability to focus by training the brain to apply limited processing power more efficiently. In this study, volunteers had to identify two numbers flashed on a computer screen amid a stream of letters. After three months of meditation training, volunteers were able to name the second number significantly more often. EEG recordings of brain activity showed that those subjects devoted less effort to finding the first target, thus freeing more brainpower to focus on finding the second.

A study at San Francisco University showed that meditation improved pain endurance. They mapped electrical activity in the brain of a yoga master while he had his tongue pierced. The research found that the pattern of brain activity suggests that the meditating yogi entered a state similar to that produced by pain-numbing drugs.

Another study showed that long-term* meditators showed a 40 percent to 50 percent reduction in brain activity in response to pain* compared with a control group of non-meditators.

A few studies suggest that meditation can change how the brain responds to advancing age. Researchers at Emory University in Atlanta compared 13 older adults who regularly practiced Zen meditation with non-meditators of similar age. Among the latter, shrinking brain size and declining performance on attention tests correlated with age: The older the subject, the smaller the brain volume and the worse the performance. Among meditators, advancing age did not correlate with brain shrinkage or declining attention skills.

The findings match those of a 2005 study at Harvard Medical School, which found that brain regions involved in focusing attention and processing sense information were thicker in meditators than age-matched non-meditators.

Source: OregonLive.com

I’m a bit of a fan of Steve Pavlina who runs one of the best websites on personal development. In addition, his wife, Erin is a psychic medium and has a site of her own, where she tells her own interesting stories and insights on life. Steve is also interested and practicing some of the psychic stuff, but he’s not as experienced and as natural as she is.

Anyway, Steve also has a podcast where he mostly talks about his topics but from time to time he’ll shift to the more esoteric topics. His latest podcast episode is called “Being Psychic” and it’s 1 and half hours of conversation between him and Erin about her experiences. It is a very interesting episode and it gives some insight into her life and her view of the esoteric part of life.

I’ve already been somewhat familiar with parts of the content, since I follow their sites, but for anyone not familiar with them I’m sure it will be even more interesting. Some of the topics covered in this podcast are:

• Story of how Erin developed her psychic skills from a young age
• Lucid dreaming
• Astral projection
• How Erin made the shift to doing professional psychic readings
• Erin’s Criss Angel story
• Lessons from 1000+ professional readings
• Skeptics, skepticism, disbelief, and reading for skeptics vs. believers
• Psychic junkies
• The role of free will
• Spirit guides, angels, and humans who’ve crossed over
• What happens when you die? What is it like on the other side?
• Distinguishing genuine psychic impressions from emotions and imagination
• Why charge money for readings? Why not do them for free?
• How to price your readings when you read professionally
• What happens during a psychic reading? How does it work?
• Why do different people get such different readings?
• Chakras
• Do psychics predict the future?
• Difference between a psychic and a medium
• How to develop your own psychic/intuitive skills
• How personal development continues after you die

You can read more about the episode and listen to it from Being psychic podcast.

I introduce another article by dreq hempel who wrote here such articles as How Qigong or Taoist Yoga Explains Gurdjieff and The Highest Technology of All Technologies: The Yan Xin Secret

Gurdjieff and the Triode Amplifier: Your I-thought is the Pre-Amp, Taoism is the Triode Amplifier

by drew hempel, MA
anti-copyright

Normally the mind is weak and we are controlled by our emotions, causing sickness and lack of potential free energy.

As Gurdjieff states the West relies on dualism – whereas he relies on the Law of Three. There is an exception though in the West – THE TRIODE AMPLIFIER.

To turn your mind into a triode amplifier you first need a PRE-AMP. The I-thought – without visions and without words – is the pre-amp grid which reverses and amplifies the weak current that normally exists in our brain.

80% of our brain’s energy is used for vision but when we are asleep people rely on sound to wake us. Just as Einstein used the Doppler Effect to develop his theory of relativity – so too does the phase-shift of frequency create a significant increase in amplitude.

That’s the secret of quantum chaos Brian Goodwin – a biologist who authored “Temporal Order of Cells” and is now the inspiration for digital biology at M.I.T. Basically Kirkhoff’s Law – harmonic functions – apply equally to mechanical and electrical systems.

So back to your brain – the pineal gland exists between the ears – in the center of the head. When we hold onto the I-thought we activate the pineal gland as the pre-amp grid, just like a triode tube amp.

So normally there’s ALWAYS a weak current between the inner ears – the grid of the I-thought blocks that current and then amplifies it as a reversed current – a 180 degree shift.

This is just like how pedaling a bike makes you go forward – but you can’t explain this to someone, they just have to learn how to do it. The first time I was lied to, that I remember, was when I was taught how to ride a bike. The mind or talking and seeing is cheap. We learn through experience.

Einstein liked to use bike riding as a metaphor – just keep moving so we off-set the inertia which normally makes the wheels wobble side to side. You can see this by holding a wheel at the axle and spinning it – you can’t hold it because it wobbles side to side.

So gravity is just the velocity and acceleration of the forward motion while the mass causes the inertia. Intensity of energy is actually caused by frequency, not mass as amplitude. So gravity uses logarithmic math while quantum energy uses divide and average statistics but BOTH are dualistic. The triode amp is different – it uses Gurdjieff’s Law of Three whereby the I-thought, as the Pre-Amp, harmonizes the Will and
Consciousness.

The amplified current is the kidney energy (will), the spinning of the wheel, is the reverse breathing, activated through the I-thought.

But remember – the whole system relies on putting that PRE-AMPLIFIER or grid in place.

Gurdjieff emphasized that most Western alchemists just focused on the chemistry – what Taoists call the Jing – and therefore the energy level was just left at the emotional level.

He said the reason is because the West is too materialistic and didn’t take into account that alchemy starts with the I-thought. So will power is driven by the I-thought – the YI or intention in Taoism – reverses the desire of what our eyes see, so that the weak current between our ears now, with the pre-amp in place – the grid of the I-thought, is activated, reversed and AMPLIFIED.

I am hosting the second volume of the qigong and Energy arts forum.

Anmol Mehta posted the article Free Online Yoga Video – Breath of Fire Yoga Breathing Exercise
This king kong of pranayamas helps you detoxify your system, oxygenate your blood, magnify the benefits of the Kundalini Yoga exercise you are doing and generate terrific energy within. If you suffer from heat related issues or high blood pressure, you should use caution when practicing Breath of Fire.

I want to add my article Top 5 healthy relaxation techniques to the list, where you’ll learn 5 of the best relaxation techniques I know of.

This concludes the second edition of Qigong and Energy Arts Forum. You may submit your article for the next edition, to be published in a few weeks’ time.

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, sometimes called Madame Blavatsky (1831-1891), was one of the founders of The Theosophical Society, and was one of the most leading occult teachers of the 19th century. She brought the mystical knowledge of India into the western world and wrote several important occult books, most known of which is The Secret Doctrine, published in 1884.

I’ve found a good written article about her life at: http://blavatskyarchives.com/longseal.htm for those who are interested in the biography of this extraordinary woman.

Itigelov several years before death. (click for larger photo)

The story of story of Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov might be an interesting one, but the story of his body after his death is so much more interesting. Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov (1852-1927) was a Buddhist Lama of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. During his lifetime he was selected to the post of the 12th Pandido Khambo Lama – head of Russian buddhists. He was a guest of the Russian czars and has helped Russian troops during WWI by collecting money and provisions. But the most interesting fact about him is the fact of his death legacy.

At age 75 Itigilov asked other lamas to start meditation ceremonies for the passing, since he was going to die. The lamas did not start since he was still alive. So Itigilov started the rites himself and other lamas joined him later. He was in the lotus posture at the time of his death. His testimony was to bury him just as he was at the time of his death in a pine box and it also included clauses that demanded his body to be exhumed by other monks at later times.

In the years 1955 and 1973 his body was examined by several buddhist monks only to find that it did not decay. They have changed the clothes on the body and put him back in the pine box. In the year 2002, on September 11, after the fall of communist and very atheist Russia, his body was exhumed again and transferred to Ivolginsky datsan (a residence of today’s Khambo Lama). There it was examined both by scientists, pathologists and monks. Professor Viktor Zvyagin of the Federal Center of Forensic Medicine examined the body and concluded that it was in the condition of someone who had died 36 hours ago.

After the exhumation of Itigilov’s body it does not perish. There’s no fungus or other signs of physical decay. It is left in the open for display but no photographs of the dead are allowed according to Buddhist tradition. Yet, there are some photos taken in 2002, when his body was exhumed (see below).

Those of who are interested in scientific research of healing might find interest in the Journal of Science and Healing called Explore. The current issue is free and its papers can be downloaded in PDF format. The latest issue includes a paper by Dr. Dean Radin, Gail Hayssen and James Walshcalled, called Effects of Intentionally Enhanced Chocolate on Mood which shows through a double-blind, randomized and placebo-controlled study that people who ate chocolate that was exposed to “good intentions” had better mood than those eating unexposed chocolate. If you want a more detailed review of the chocolate study read here.

Other papers include a study by a group of Chinese doctors on The Effect of Chinese Medicinal Herbs in Relieving Menopausal Symptoms in Ovariectomized Chinese Women. This study tested an established formula of Chinese medicinal herbs in elieving menopausal symptoms in ovariectomized women (whatever that means). What’s important is that the results showed that ” Chinese herbs may be a useful alternative treatment for ovariectomized women suffering from menopausal symptoms, who are unable or do not want to receive hormone replacement therapy (HRT).”.

Another article discusses new studies that support the therapeutic value of meditation. These are only 3 articles from a larger variety available in the current issue. Going into the archives shows that two more issues of the journal have free access. One can also subscribe to the actual paper journal for a price.

Enjoy your reading.

Yet another article by Brian regarding a study of ESP and OBE.

On the Latest Study of ESP & OBEs

The most recent study that examines the possibility of OBE in relation to ESP performance was reported by two Italian researchers, Guido Del Prete _and _Patrizio Tressoldi (2005), in the latest issue of the Journal of Parapsychology. Their study, inspired in part by the successful ESP/OBE study by Palmer and Lieberman (1975) described in my review post, in particular focused on the possibility of enhancing ESP performance through an altered state of consciousness, specifically the hypnagogic state (the state between wakefulness and sleep). Simon Sherwood (2002) of the University College Northampton has done extensive research over the past few years on the possible relation between hypnogogic states and the experience of ostensibly anomalous phenomena (to include hallucinations of a sense of presence related to apparitions, sensations of body paralysis or weightlessness that may given the impression of OBE, and the experience of ESP-like dream imagery), finding that, although many natural hypnagogic experiences may be misinterpreted as being anomalous, some may also be influenced by ESP and other psi processes. The study by Del Prete and Tressoldi explores that possibility further in a lab setting by attempting to artificially induce a hypnagogic-like state in their study participants through hypnosis (this hypnagogic-like state was characterized by deep muscle relaxation, slow and calm breaths, reports of seeing spontaneous images, slow eye movement, and a sensation of hand paralysis). The OBE aspect comes in through Del Prete and Tressoldi giving the participants suggestions emphasizing the experience of OBE while they are in a hypnotic state (e.g, they gave the participant indirect suggestions on the experience of flying away from the body, and words of encouragement to believe that OBE was possible and to want an OBE to happen during the test).

This story started back in the end 2005, when I started to follow it. It’s about a 15-year old boy(at that time), Ram Bahadur Bomjom , who according to news, was already meditating for 6 months straight at that time. My original report of him appeared in article: A boy in Nepal has been meditating for 6 months. The boy was, supposedly, meditating for all that time without eating or drinking. He was called The Buddha boy by the locals, since he was sitting meditating under a pipal tree for such a long time in around the same geographical region. Thousands of people visited his meditation site at that time.

Then, around February 2006, after 9 months of meditation the Buddha boy disappeared. There were some speculations that he was kidnapped but it turned out to be false. In December 2006, now 16-year old boy reappeared. Now, there seems to be some renewed interest in him, after he appeared before a crowd and preached. Source writes that his message was: “The only way we can save this nation (Nepal) is through religion.” Well, I waited for more a man meditating for such a long period of time.

It’s interesting how his story will continue from here.

I’ve written before about my first qigong lesson. Nowadays, I still go the classes and am much more knowledgable on the subject.

But first, what is Qigong, anyway? Qigong (pronounced like chee-kong) is an ancient Chinese system of working with the Qi (Chi) energy. The translation from Chinese is something in the lines of “energy cultivation” or “Working with energy”. It is a system of exercises involving postures, movement, breathing, meditation and mind body interaction. Qigong was the basis both for the Chinese healing and to martial arts. As such there are many variations to qigong and some are more relevant to combat while others to healing.

I’ve learned that the specific form of qigong that I study is called YiQuan qigong (pronounced e-chuan). This specific form of qigong was founded in the 1920ies by master Wang Xiangzhai, who developed it out of another martial arts system, xingyiquan. Although it started as a form of martial arts qigong it is now studied mostly for health benefits. In many places it still learned as a martial arts qigong, similarly to kungfu. At the end of the post I attached two videos of master Yao Zongxun (1917-1985), who was the formal successor of Wang Xiangzhai. In these videos one can see the exercises.

As I wrote before, there are several types of exercises in the Yiquan. One type is call Shi li and they are motion exercises. The motion is usually slow and has many aspects to mastering it, including body control, relaxed and diaphragmic breathing, synchronous movements of various joints and energy control. You can see many Shi Li performed in the first video of Yao Zongxun starting with around 2:43 minutes.